Re: [LAU] Developing perfect pitch

On Fri, Apr 16, 2010 at 7:33 AM, Atte André Jensen <atte.jensen(a)gmail.com> wrote: How about a different tack on this idea? Nearly everyone has the ability to reproduce mentally sounds exactly as they hear them. The ability lacked is to name heard pitches or to reproduce those pitches from names. Let's suppose that no natural gifts or specific developmental period is necessary. Retrieving pitch from memory is accurate. The auditory system reproduces sounds mentally with the same networks that it uses to perceive sounds, and the dynamics of those networks in memory closely mirror their same activity during perception--it just takes a context in order to retrieve a desired pitch. As an example experiment, you can consider that I ask you to sing 'E' without any context and then afterward ask you to sing the first note of 'Mary had a little lamb' (or some other over-learned melody). This simple experiment ought to convince you that you have the ability to recall and reproduce a certain set of exact pitches you have memorized in some context. So, I would recommend the following method to learn perfect pitch (and any feedback/critique is welcome): 1. Compose 12 melodies that start on each of the 12 notes within your vocal range; give them words or names, just something that lets you recall each one from a cue. 2. Practice the melodies with a well-tuned instrument (or synth) until you can reliably recall the melodies mentally 3. Sing the melodies to be able to reproduce them accurately by voice Next, you get to the part that more closely resembles pitch matching exercises. You want to transfer your newly acquired specific pitch memories to the ability to recall pitches by name. The ability to name heard pitches in different contexts (other music) will come with time, exposure, and practice comparing heard pitches against memorized pitches. You have built one context in which you can remember 12 pitches exactly, and you need to reduce the influence of that context over time to build a relatively context-independent skill. 4. Drill, baby, drill. You want to practice the skills to reproduce named pitches and to recall names for pitches. For each trial on a given pitch name, recall the first note of the corresponding melody, sing it, and compare against the sound reproduced by instrument or synth. For each trial with a given sound, name the pitch and get feedback on whether it was correct. 5. Repeat drills periodically, with plenty of time (days, weeks, months) in between practices. You want to forget everything you learned in steps 1-3, which will happen over time in the course of learning other things (forgetting by interference), and you will also need to vary your practice with different instrument sounds and sounds in actual musical contexts. Chuck